Canada Eh!

5 days, 3 mountains, 4 days of fresh snow, and 120,000+ feet of vertical. You could say Canada treated us well. Detailed reviews of each mountain we skied to come (when I find time).

After the 23hr drive and little sleep, we started our Canadian adventure with chorizo breakfast burritso in Banff at Coyotes. Then off to Sunshine Village.

Day 1 was ironically a cloudy/foggy day at Sunshine Village. A couple inches of fresh snow made the skiing bearable but not fantastic. We skied the whole mountain in search of the best lines but ran into shallow cover littered with rocks almost everywhere we went. Despite the sub par conditions, we still managed to make it over 20,000 feet of vertical. We ended the day with a pint of Molson Canadian at the bottom for a reasonable price of about $4.50 U.S. In the end the conditions didn't matter much because it was day 1 on the snow for me this year and the first day of this trip. Found a little hole in the wall called The Beaver Bar that had great food and drinks.

Day 2 at Lake Louise was a happy change from day 1. There was about a foot of fresh snow in the parking lot when we arrived and another 8 inches on the truck when we left. We started off our first run by getting cliffed out. The rest of the day was spent on the paradise and ptarmigan chairs skiing the foot plus of fresh snow.

Day 3 was a bit of a shit show. After staying at a great AirBnB log cabin, it took 3 hours to drive 40 miles back to Lake Louise due to two accidents on the highway between Golden and Lake Louise. We were stopped so long we watched 3/4 of a movie and play a few card games...

The skiing was great again with a few inches of fresh snow on top of the previous. That night we made the 3hr trek to Revelstoke, BC. We tried Tim Hortons for the first time for dinner en route. The chili cheese fries were pretty darn good.

Day 4 was our first day at Revelstoke. Upon arrival to the mountain all we could hear were helicopters. There are quite a few heli-skiing outfits based out of Revelstoke. I think that made us even more excited to ski the mountain despite the fact that we weren't going heli-skiing. This mountain was amazing. I would equate it to a steeper version of Grand Targhee. The snow base was superior, the mountain was wide open, and the lift lines were short. Day 4 was our first bluebird day or skiing. We ended the day with a few Kokanees followed by a trip to Kawakubo Japanese restaurant which definitely lived up to trip advisors 2nd best place to eat in Revelstoke.

Day 5 of the ski trip was also spent at Revelstoke. The weather conditions had deteriorated compared to day 4. Unfortunately the wind and low visibility kept us off the stoke chair we spent most of the previous day on. Fortunately, poor visibility meant it was snowing and the snow conditions were great on the Ripper chair, the other upper mountain chair which services mostly gladed skiing. My dad screwed up his toe the previous day but luckily this was his last day of skiing so he skied through the pain.

After one last beer in the parking lot at Revelstoke, Mason and I went separate ways from my dad and head to Montana. We picked up a tasty 3 meat pizza at Red Tomato Pies in Golden BC. At the Roosevile MT border crossing we had our clemintines taken but they said the bananas and orange-juice were fine to keep. At the border patrol facility we also ran into a large group of about 20 bighorn sheep hanging out in the parking lot.